.3

 

 

 

DETROIT, MAY '5, mass.

 

 

THE HOUSEHOLD-"Supplement.

 

ONLY A WOMAN.

 

“ Only a woman. What can women do?"
Over and over, all a long night through,

That simple statement and the question plain
Unresting kept my scarcely conscious brain,
’Till half-awakened, half asleep, I thought
0f many deeds by noble women wrought.

“ Only a woman. What can women do?“

My soul made answer: “ All she wishes to."

It is but true when women want more “rights,"

Ii‘hey‘ve naught to do but take th:m. For all
heights,

All depths, all bread’hs, all compass that she will,

What place so e’er she chooses she can fill.

Time was when mankind said to her: “ Thus far
And no whit farther. There we place a bar,
And it would be unwomanly to try

To oversiep the bounds, or pass them by."

But now the answer is, to all, so plain,

lone need repat the words of tnis refrain.

What can a woman do? One need but ask

What‘s to be cone? No matter what the task,

Or what required. Be it courage, skill,

Patience, discretion, wisdom, strength or will,

Through every avenue she enters in,

Where women fail, men need not hope to win.
Wasnmoron. EL. SEE.

 

OUR FUNERAL CUSTOMS.

Not long after A. H. J. entered her pro-
test against the custom of watching with
the dead and making the occasion one of
unseemly hilarity or gossip, 1 was asked to
give my opinions on our burial rites, and
something about city ways. lhave rather
hesitated to give my own views, because
they differ so greatly from those accepted by
most rural communities; but after all, why
need any of us fear to express an honest
conviction, because it is not quite in ac-
cordance with popular custom?

“Burial private” are words now very
frequently seen in the announcement of
deaths in our city papers. This is right;
but the words should never be necessary,
for to my thinking all burials ought to be
private—unless indeed of some man whom
a nation mourns, as a great statesman or
philanthropist, where an exception might
be made. Death brings the deepest sad-
ness, the most profound grief; the bereaved
ones retire from society for a period,
abandon amusements, and attire themselves
in the “customary suit of solemn black.”
What an incongruity for a crowd of casual
acquaintances, lukewarm friends, careless

‘ semi-strangers, to crowd the house of death.

half-pitying, wholly criticizing, observant
ofall that passes, and commenting on the
attire and bearing of “the mourners,” es-
timating the cost of the coffin and monop-
olizing in their indiiference the last few
moments before a final farewell! No one

 

 

presumes to attend a wedding or any other
family festivity without an invitation, why
should strangers intrude upon us in our
grief and the agony of parting with our be-
loved dead, when they would not presume
to approach us in our rejoicing? Sorrow is
far more exclusive and selfish than joy.
Moreover, this public funeral demands a
compliance with an etiquette in the way of
mourning dress, which often necessitates
the jarring interruption of dressmaker and
milliner; often the whole family must sit
downto sew in order to make somebody
presentable to the critical public eve.

I would have all funerals from the house
of. the deceased, and announcements of
death sent only to the intimate friends and
relatives; there should be no sermon, no
panegyric of virtues nor glossing of infirmi-
ties, only that beautiful, appropriate and
consoling rite, the Episcopal burial service,
or such modification of it as is now in quite
universal use among ministers of other
denominations. There should be flowers
upon the coffin, but there should be no ex-
posure of the dead face; better that those
who knew and loved the silent sleeper
should remember him as instinct with life
and intelligence than as pulseless clay al-
tered by the chill of death. I once saw a
mother force her child to look upon the
dead in spite of the little one’s terrified
resistance, and consider such action wanton
cruelty to a sensitive nature. I could
sympathize with the child, for in my own
youth a dead face would haunt me for
weeks—I saw it everywhere, it came be-
tween me and my book, to close my eyes
was to summon it, it visited my dreams;
and not till I became a woman grown could
I overcome that morbid, unreasoning dread.

It is a popular idea that presence at a
funeral indicates respect and sympathy on
the part of others. It ought, and I trust
often does; but there is alWays a contingent
who come, as an old lady said, because they
enjoy atuneral. I have heard of instances
here in this city, where those who were
almost unacquainted with the deceased
crowded into the carriages provided till
there were not enough for the family; it
was “a free ride,” .and quite a treat on
a pleasant day, to those who seldom
traveled except by horse—car.

A little child died near my home here,
not long ago, the white crape and ribbons
upon the door being almost the first we
knew there was illness in the house. When
the day of the funeral arrived a few friends
and relatives gathered in the parlors, the
clergyman read a psalm and made a prayer,
some friends sang that old hymn, *“ See the

 

kind shepherd Jesus stands,” the under-
taker took the little white coftin, covered
with flowers, in his arms and laid it on the
front seat of the close coupe, in which were
seated the father and mother, a few friends
followed in carriages, and at the cemetery
the open grave, concealed under a lining
of evergreens, typical of the eternity of the
soul, received the little broken bud while
that solemn bequeathal—“Dust to dust.
ashes to ashes,” was made. Quite as simple
and impressive was the funeral of an adult.
Those whose pleasure it was to take a last
look of their friend as she lay in her coflin
came early, and before the clergyman began
the service the undertaker had screwed
down the lid of the casket, upon which lay
agreat cluster of roses, from buds to full
bloom, “ a rose for every year of a. beauti-
ful life,” and on pedestals at the head and
foot were placed the floral pieces sent by
friends. Only relatives and intimate
friends were present, these who had known
and loved the departed, and whose grief had
been heart-felt. There was no sermon, no
“ remarks,” just the burial service of the
church of which she was a member.

As we become more refined and cultured,
good taste teaches us to avoid ostentation
and display of either joy or sorrow in
public. Those who have read Scatt’s
“ Bride of Lammermoor ” will get a fairly
good idea of the wassail and feasting which
followed the death of the head of the family
in those days. The Master of Havenswood
came to an estate impoverished by the
prodigality of the funeral feast of the old
Master; and though we do not carry matters
to such an extreme, nor make a funeral a
carousal, some of our customs are descendant
from those times; and often, when the
costly casket and shroud and the flowers are
paid for, and the bills for the mourning
met, the survivors find themselves as bad
oif as was Edgar of Ravenswood. It is our
impulse to spend lavishly on such occasions:
we feel these are our last offices for the dead,
perhaps some latent thought of atonement
for past neglect or deprivation may enter in
as well, and perhaps, too, a less worthy
motive, “the speech of people,” their com-
ments and criticisms, may influence us.
But good taste, and the usages of our best
society, require only that “everything he
done decently and in order,” avoiding
vulgar ostentation, display or parade. .Let
us bury our dead as they lived, quietly, sur-
rounded only by friends, asking no pulpit
eloquence to make us weep by lacerating our
crushed hearts anew, nor expose the wasted,
changed features to the careless, indifferent
eye. Bna'rnlx.

 


 

THE HOUSEHOLD.

 

WOMAN’S PROGRESS.

 

We have all read of the Woman’s Con-
gress that has just been in session in

Washington; of the success of the meeting
as far as representation is concerned, eighty-
seven speakers being present. and fifty-
three organizations for women represented.
Very different was this gathering from the
one held forty years ago in Geneva Falls,
N. Y., and so probably thought the six
pioneer women who sat on the rostrum.
Then the ball was set in motion to give
woman the ballot to elevate her posi-
tion. Let us see if woman’s position has
been elevated. what she has done for her-
self during the past forty years without the
ballot. Forty years ago there was not a
woman physician in the United States,
Miss Elizabeth Blackwell was the first
woman found worthy, after a course of study
at the Geneva College in New York, to re-
ceive a diploma. Her sister Emily soon
followed, and the two sisters, classed as
pioneers in that profession, must ever merit
respect and admiration from the medical
fraternity, which to-day numbers one
thousand receiving from one thousand dol-
lars a month to fifty thousand a year. Dr.
Sarah Hackett Stevenson, of Chicago, was
the representative at Washington, and if
she handles her “ physics ” as skillfully as
she does her pen, she is justly entitled to
the place she fills to-day. Miss Phebe
Couzins was admitted to the bar in 1871, in
Missouri; Mrs. B. H. Mansfield in 1869 in
Iowa; Miss Belva Lockwood followed soon
after. has since been a candidate for the
presidency, but was defeated of course.
Miss Couzins is United States Marshal in
Missouri, the first Woman ever appointed
to that office. Mrs. Frank Leslie is a fair
“type” of the feminine printing press.
Assuming the absolute control of her hus-
band’s office at his demise, she brought the
whole business, which was in bad shape,
from what seemed to be financial ruin to an
independent, firm basis. It is written that
the lady receives so many offers of mar-
riage that she is obliged to keep printed
refusals, to economize time. How this must
radio the feelings of. those females who we
know have never had the pleasure of
giving one verbal re fusal!

Of women ministers, we have many since
Lucretia Mott’s call to speak, who con
sider that the Divine command, “ Go preach
My gospel,” was meant for them as well as-
the sterner sex, and it is a fact that they are
very successful. The “proof of the pud-
dingis in chewing the string,” and for this
reason we call about one-half of the
ordained ministers poor, when we sit and
try to digest and assimilate some of their
dry, senseless sermons; and if women can
get up in the pulpit and explain, and give
their ideas of the Bible and every day
Christian life, in a pleasant, entertaining
manner, and if they can tell it good, it Wit]
be heard and appreciated every time. They
are filling their place. surely. Miss Frances
Willard as a temperance advocate and
reformer will need no monument to per-
petuate her memory; her good deeds will
iiveafter her. She never rises to address
an audience unless she knows what she

 

is talking about—j ust what she wants tosay
and how she wants to say it!

We find women in colleges filling pro-
fessors’ chairs; writing editorials, copying
in studies; counting rooms; saleswomen;
dressmakers. According to a directory
lately publishedin New York City there are
several billiard rooms kept by women; fifty-
one are managing lager beer saloons;
twenty-one butchers; one a blacksmith; one
a druggist; two undertakere; five in livery
stables; three are pawnbrokers; two in
exchange offices, fifty-two physicians and
three book sellers. In fact it is one of the
impossibilities to find anything nowadays
that has not “a woman in it.” Oskaloosa,
Kan., proved this conclusively at the spring
election, when the town adopted “pet-
ticoat ” government. If this be the order of
affairs, if this is the outgrowth of woman
suffrage, the men will have to emigrate to
Alaska, for there will be nothing for them
todo. Is it not a delightful prospect to
look ahead to, my brothers?

Let’s give three cheers for the much abused
masculines, .
Blow the big fish horn and beat the tin pan,
Left pump in the rear with no office for you to

And willh whisky and lager to get—if you can.

Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton told the peo-
ple that “ We never have had any women,
the world has never known what a woman
was; they were merely echoes of men!” Let
us see if history will endorse this sentiment.
Among the women of Israel we find named
Deborah, who bore the title of “ Mother in
Israel;” she was most beautiful in charac-
ter, she lived a noble life. Greece and
Rome had great women as well as men.
Cicero said of Cornelia, “Had she been a
man she would have been deserving of the
first place among philosophers.” We read
of a Spartan mother who handed a shield
to her son who was departing for a field of
deadly strife. saying. “ Return as a con-
queror or a corpse;” another Spartan
mother on hearing her son say his sword
was too short for him, said “Add another
step to it.” Those familiar with “The
Days of Bruce” will say that neVel‘
breathed nobler woman than Isabella of
Buchan, and scores of others who followed
their husbands, buckled on their armor,
and bade them “ God speed.”

Atrue woman is a woman anywhere, I
do not care where you place her. It may
be on a throne, in a Woman’s Council, on
the rostrumor, in a home. The main thing is
to fill our place well. Miss Susan B.
Anthony says the reason she never married
was because she never wanted it engraved
on the marble slab placed over her, that she
was a relict of a man. Let this wise woman
wield her gavel. Let her shout “On to
the polls!" Let these agitators of woman’s
rights join hands with anarchists and
socialists, and let.the scenes of the French
releution be again enacted. Let me ask
the loved and honored wife if she feels safe
on the strong arm of a husband and in her
trust in him; the happy mother as she claSps
the rosy babe to her heart, feels the caress
of the little dimpled hands, the sweet kiss,
the blessed little presence, if she is happy
and contentei, if she has no envious
thoughts of the great Susan 8. who has such
an abhorrence of pantaloons, and I will
venture my bottom dollar she will answer,

 

“ She may hold all the big ofilces she can:
she may have the ballot from now till
eternity; give me my home and loved ones.
and all her talk about ‘a relict’ is boshi The
reason Susan never married was because
she never had an opportunity; sour grapes
you know.” \

But I am wondering if women are may
to vote yet. If she bring an ignorant vote.
how will the affairs of the nation be bene-
fitted? According to statistics one-fifth of
the voters at the present time are unable
to read the ballot they deposit, one sixth
cannot write their nam s. The foreign ele-
ment in our country is enormous, immigra-
tion has increased faster than the most of
us realize; foreigners are pouring into Castle
Garden at the rate of one thousand per day;
one year's residence here is sufficient to
naturalize and civilize (?) them. Do you
suppose they have the least idea of the
nature of a vote? What do they know about
the candidate for ofiice? Their vote is con-
trolled by men however who do know what
man they want in ofiice, controlled by
liquor and money. Our neighboring town
of Athens controls the “poor Indian’s”
vote the same way; he is filled up on
whisky “straight” and deposits the billet
that has been put in his hand. No matter
how small the town it has its “ring.” No!
[say when woman suffrage comes lotus
have at least an intelligent vote; we can in-
form ourselves on the political questions of
the day, we can influence our husbands,
sons and brothers in many ways, and let
this be the first question that we agitate.
Would it not be wise to have a set of ques-
tions—a regular catechism-that every
person that comes to be registered, or to
vote, be drilled in it, and if they fail to
answer clearly and intelligently, or show
ignorance regarding the matter, they shall
not be considered eligible to vote. This is
my idea of woman suffrage and suffrage in
general. Evanonuxn.

Bar-rm: Cnaax.

___.__...—-—-——
WHITE AND BLACK DRESSES.

The fashion journals tell us white dresses
are not to be worn so much as heretofore
this summer; and indeed one might guess
as much from the meagre display of white
goods in the merchants’ windows. The
preference seems to be for colors. The
white goods on exhibition so far are mostly
semi-transparent, in irregular plaids formed
by satin stripes of various widths; they
range in price, in fine quality, from ‘35 to 50
cents per yard. Such dresses are trimmed
with embroidery, and ought to be made
very simply for convenience in laundrying.
Thinner goods have small figures tamboured
upon them, or a plain material is used in
combination with the all over embroidery or
wide fiouncing. White dresses are pretty
and appropriate for home wear, but are not
suitable for the street, and every year we
see fewer of them worn outside the house.
We have many light, inexpensive, dainty
fabrics nowdays, and among them we can
find a substitute for the crude white dresses,
greatly to the euchancement of the com-
plexion and figure. Many girls who live
in small towns, or in the country, think a
whitedress the most elaborate toilette they

noageO’fiEBS

 

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THE HOUSEHOLD.

can make for any unusual occasion, and I
often see them at fairs. or picnics or excur-
sions, in dresses which bear the marks of a
long dusty ride in carriage or the cars. No
doubt they looked fresh and pretty when
they took a final survey of themselves in the
mirror before leaving home, but white is
notthecorrect thing for traveling. Keep
your white dresses for the parlor, and wear
a wool or satteen, or one of the figured
China silks, in your trips to town or at
agricultural exhibitions. And if you must
wear white, don’t starch it stiff as a board,
but let it be soft and clinging; the frou-frou
of stiffly starched skirts is not agreeable
music. .

Any lady who has an old black silk dress
on hand, and is in doubt about her summer
Sunday—go-to-meeting-dress, cannot do bet-
ter than to plan a black lace dress, for
which her worn silk shall be the founda-
tion. The fashion in which this is done
must of course depend upon the quantity
of the silk. One way is to cover the front
and sides with lace flounces, slightly
gathered, with back draperies of the silk;
another provides a deep apron of the 42-
inch lace flouncing, with lace flounces filling
the space where the apron is drawn up; in
fact almost any style is fashionable. The
“very latest” are what are called “ Empire”
dresses, and perhaps where practicable it
would be best to make up new goods in
this manner, since it is good economy to
’follow the most recent fashion to a moder-
ate degree. Afoundation skirt of silk is
made, gored as usual, with a little more
fullness behind. and finished at the foot by
a narrow knife pleating. Two steels are
placed quite low in the back. The skirt is
of figured piece late or Chantilly net, as it
is called, is full and straight, gathered to a
belt, hemmed around the bottom and
trimmed with three or five rows of narrow
watered ribbon, graduated in width. This
skirt sometimes opens up the left side, the
ribbon trimming being continued up each
side of the opening to the waist, and a
band of beaded net is set in as a panel; or
there may be four or five lengthwise pleats
of the net with two long bands of ribbon
falling to the foot and each ending in a
rosette. The waist lining is cut like a
basque 'and the net is gathered on the
shoulders in front and back and sewed in
with the seams of the silk lining, this full-
ness is shirred at the waist line, front and
back, and carried on to the bottom of the
dining, though all that part below the waist
.line is out of sight under the belt of the
skirt. In the pointed space left open at the
throats plastron is set, made of net over
silk and dotted with pendant beads, and
this is finished round the neck by a high
collar of watered silk ribbon fastened under
a bow; the side back and under arm forms
are of lace placed smoothly over the silk
lining. A sash of watered ribbon six inches
wide is sewed in the left under arm seam
nearly its full width, is folded entirely
around the waist, and brought to the right
side where it books, is tied in a small bow
and descends in two ends nearly to the foot
of the skirt. . The sleeves have a close silk
lining, on which the net is set on in folds
above the elbow. and plain below; watered
ribbon is tied around jut below the elbow,

 

and again at the wrist, with a bow at the
inside seam. It will be seen that this is a
simple, stylish, new and elegant model. and
a charming variation on the styles so long
worn. It is not so expensive. either, as
might be thought. This same style will be
used a great deal for commencement
dresses, for receptions and for bridesmaids’
dresses, copied in white net over white
moire, or, more plainly, in nun’s veiling,
or albatross cloth. It is a style charmingly
youthful and becoming to slight figures.

I saw a fine black wool dress made up in
something like this style the other day, and
admired it very much. The fronts and
back were tucked in the shape of a pointed
yoke, the tucks being fine and narrow, and
the fullness thus made was shirred at the
waist line, under a belt of the dress
material with a handsome silver buckle.
The sleeves were tucked to the elb)w, where
they were plain, a band of ribbon being
placed just below the elbow. The skirt had
a panel of narrow tucks like the yoke.

BE a’l‘RIX.

——‘.’-———

A HIRED GIRL’S VIEW.

No one can perfectly describe any place
or object until seen from all possible points
and at different times, neither can one un-
derstand a subject that concerns the rela-
tion that exists between two different
classes of people without viewing it from the
standpoint of each. “ One of the Mis-
tresses ” has given her views, permit me as
a hired girl to give mine.

As nearly as I can learn, years ago the
hired girl became one of the members of the
home and was as a sister or daughter to the
mistress. This was due to the fact the
were on an equality every way. No great
fortunes had been amassed; no long titles
attached to names. none had greater edu-
cational advantages than others, nothing in
fact whereby they could claim superiority.
Now all this is changed, and a sensible girl
does not expect nor want to stand where
the girl of old did, but she does have rights
that ought to be respected.

We ought to be hired to do a certain
amount and kind of work, or a certain
number of hours should be called a day’s
work. The kitchen ought to be our domain
to the exclusion of children, except when
they are sent upon errands, and then let the
errand be made known in a respectful man-
ner.

If while measuring goods for a customer
a clerk should be annoyed by the employer’s
ten year old child teasing for a piece of it,
or declaring the goods was not being
rightly measured, there would be cause for
complaint, the justice of which all could
see. Is it not a parallel case when the
child enters the kitchen in the same way!

It occurs to me that women are the foun-
ders of caste. The merchant and clerk
meet upon the street, at the club room or
private residence, not as employers and
employee but as man and man. Some
women, but not many, would thus dare
recognize the hired girl, for fear she might
be mistaken for the girl perhaps. It is
not required the hired girl he treated as your
most intimate friend nor yet as your
enemy. We do not demand nor wish to be

 

3

u

made your confidant, we are under no ob.
ligationsto you nor you to us other than
the contract calls for. We think we ought
to stand just where any other laborer
stands, the teacher, the clerk or the seam-
stress who give their time and work in ex-
change for money; so do we.

We ought to be hired upon two weeks’
trial. If at the end of the week you are
not satisfied with our work, give as notice
that we may find another place; if pleaseda
contract should be made for a certain
length of time, subject to dismissal for
cause only.

Ladies, we only ask to be treated as
human beings. I believe the Golden Rule
was given for all. J annmn.

---—-——Qeo———-

WASHING MACHINES.

I would like to tell Aunt Mary my ex-
perience in making washing easy. I noticed
an article in the HOUSEHOLD of the 14th
ult., by J. G. A., of Paw Paw, giving her
trials and troubles over washing, and the
different methods she has tried; but I can-
not agree with her. I have used the machine
shereferstoas “the small tin affair” and
am perfectly satisfied with it. It not only
saves labor but the wear of the clothes; and
while J. G. A. is rubbing hers mine are
being washed in the boiler, and 1 am busy
in doing the morning’s work. Aperson
who says it will do good the first time and
afterwards claims it does not, is guilty at
what I call carelessness in using it properly.

1 have used one four months, and my
clothes could be compared with those
washed on any board, and I am sure the
whiteness would be superior instead of
inferior if the washing was done by “the
small tin affair,” and I know where one has
been used ayear with equal success. As
for rusting. everybody knows that tin will
not rust if properly dried after rusting, if
so what would we do with our boilers,
baking tins, milk pans, pails, etc. I know
nothing of the other machine mentioned,
but I would advise Aunt Miry to try the
machines first, then if she prefers J. G. A.’s
way in place of “the small tin alhir,” all
right, but I would be determined to quit
housekeeping if I had to do that way.

Kuaxazoo. H. R. I.

-———-—-—-«.——-

THE LAUNDRY.

 

J avelle water will often take out obstinate
mildew.

Fruit, tea and coffee strains should be re-
moved by pouring boiling water through
them.

Flannels should be washed first in warm
suds, then rinsed in water of the same
temperature.

Articles of a delicate blue should be
washed in water to which an ounce of
sugar of lead has been added.

Ginghams and calicoes should be ironed
on the wrong side to produce the lusterless
effect seen in new material.

Table linen should be ironed single until
quite dry, then folded by a thread or rolled
upon around stick as long as the cloth is

wide. Mm. Mum
Foals! Loner.

 


 

4:

THE HOUSEHOLD.

  

 

 

KITCHEN. UTENSILS.

 

1 have often thought of the waste in our
kitchens for the want of proper or sufficient
utensils to perform work as it should be
_ done. There is no economy in doing with-
out the implements of our business. What
would we think of the farmer who day after

day would spend an extra five minutes
“toggling up ” a broken harness when a
ten cent strap would avoid the delay? We

women are not sufficiently careful of our
time; that is the reason we have so little to
spare. The fuel we burn in baking a cake,
' one layer at a time. for want of tins of the
right size or shape to bake the other two,

would soon buy the tins. How much time
we waste beating eggs with a fork, when an
egg-beater would do the work so much
more swiftly and easily. To be compelled to
bother with a broken pump, or to “hook”
water out of a cistern with a pail and a
pole, justifies a woman in some sharp words
to her lord and master. Anything that will
lighten and expedite kitchen work ought to
be supplied in plenty; the work is constant
p and wearing; the best aids we can obtain
are none too good.

I want to say a word to those housekeep-
ers who are so careful of their silver and
plated ware that they keep it laid away “in
lavender,” only using it when company is
present, and setting the family table with
steel forks and nickel spoons. Silver ware
will last for generations; the wear upon it
is hardly appreciable, and there is no sense

in its being lost. Count the spoons at each
meal, and you will have no trouble in keep-
ing track of them. Plated ware will last
for years with decent care; do not throw
forks or tea and tablespoons into the dish-
water with the knives, nor use them to
scrape dishes with. I have twelve silver
plated forks that were in constant daily
use for fifteen years before they needed re-
plating. Then a trifling sum made them as
good as new and ready for another fifteen
years’ service.

Take the good of your good things as you
go along; and use them for the family, not
to “spread” before company. It is better
than self-denial for those who may not prize
your heritage, or vote your treasures out of
style and send them to be melted up or to
the second-hand store. Better by far to
have enough of ordinary, every day things
than costly wares too fine for your purpose,
and which are wrapped up in flannel and
put away on the high shelf of some closet
or storeroom. L. 0.

button.

_____...__.__.

A GOOD WORD FOR THE LANG-
DEAN.

I wish to answer Huldah Perkins and
tell her something of my experience with
the Langshan fowl. Beth says in the
Honsnnonn of April 2lst, “Do not mate
the Inngshan rooster with your Plymouth
Rocks, as the color is not improved by a
cross and the flavor of the Langshan is not
good,” etc.

Now I cannot in justice hear my favorite
fowls misrepresented without speaking a
word in their behalf. If Both will come to
see me I think I could easily convince her

surpassed, being neither dark in flesh nor
have they decorated bones, as she chooses to
term them. The Langshans are vigorous,
steady layers of large, rich eggs, and are
good mothers; they begin to lay at five
months of age, are of good weight, and any
common fence will keep them in bounds,
as they are very domestic.

A cross with Plymouth Rocks results in a
large bird, a peculiarity being the fact that
the females of the cross are, all black in
color—with clean yellow legs, while the
males have the Plymouth Rock plumage
with feathered legs. I hope Huldah will try
the cross; I am sure she will not regret it,
as I speak from personal knowledge.

Beth, your White Cochins I admire very
much, their plumage is very handsome and
we all have a Special choice. Now to prove
my invitation to you is made in good faith
I will subscribe as

Morn. MRS. L. N. OLMSTED.

_.____*.._————

HEALTHY HOMES.

 

Some little time ago, Mr. Henry Lomb, of
Rochester, otfered a series of prizes for
papers on topics connected with sanitation,
through the American Public Health
Association. Prof. V. C. Vaughn, of the
University of Michigan, furnished an essay
upon “Healthy Homes and Food for the
Working Classes,” which won a prize of
$200. This essay is now printed for dis-
tribution by the Association, at a nominal
price, and ought to be widely circulated in
both town and country.

Some of Prof. Vaughn’s thoughts are
wise and instructive, and especially timely
at this season, when the annual cleaning up
indoors and out, is in progress. He says it
is absolutely essential to a. healthy house
that its cellar should be free from dampness
and ground air. Its walls and floor should
be well built, even if it becomes necessary
todeprive the house itself of some of its
ornamentation. Decaying vegetables must
not be left in the cellar, and fresh air
should be admitted into the cellar as care-
fully as into any part of the house. It is
better to sleep in the open air, with no
roof but the sky and no bed but blankets
on the dry earth than to live his house over
atilthy, damp, unventilated cellar.

The water supply ought to be of. unques-
tioned purity. Cholera, dysentery, typhoid
and scarlet fevers and diphtheria are spread
by the use of impure water. Water in
shallow wells is often surface water, and
that of the worst kind. Many people think
if water percolates through a few feet of soil
it is rendered harmless. This is a grave
mistake; its impurity is often increased.
Water passing through filth in the soil car-
ries impurities and disease germs with it.
In village lots, where the well is often close
neighbor to the water-closet, the danger of
impure water is very great.

The cistern should be of brick, and
plastered water-tight upon the outside as
well as the inside; the walls must be so
built as to prevent the water in the soil from
passing into the cistern. The top should
be well covered; the best covering would
probably be a box built up several feet above
the ground and covered with fine wire net-

which refuse would be excluded. The
pump should be of iron, never of wood; an
iron pipe with the pump in the kitchen is
is probably the best arrangement. A cis-
tern should never be built under the house.
The practice of placing near the top of a
cistern an over-flow pipe leading to a
water-closet. has cost many lives; there
should be, under no circumstances, any con-
nection between a cistern and any recep-
tacle of filth. Cistern water should always
be filtered, if used for cooking or drinking
purposes. If an epidemic disease prevails,
all drinking water should be boiled.

The ordinary closet vault, Pro. Vaughn
says, has caused more deaths than war and
famine, and is the origin of the majority of
cases of typhoid fever. Its use should be
wholly abandoned, and the dry earth closet,
with boxes or drawers be substituted. These
boxes should be emptied once a month at
least. The best earth to use is pulverized
clay with one-third its weight of loam.
Ordinary garden soil, if thoroughly dry, will
do. Sifted coal ashes are excellent as an
absorbent, and are nearly always at hand.
Waste water from the kitchen or laundry
ought never to be allowed to run into the

closet vault.
—-—-—-<O>——

OK that women the world over would
take home to their hearts and practice in
their lives the remark of Florence Night-
ingale: “ The position does not elevate
a woman socially if she be unfit for it, but a
woman already well placed socially can lose
nothing—rather will she gain by dig'nifying
the place she fills.” And again: “The
real dignity of a gentlewoman is a very
high and unassailable thing, which silently
encompasses her from her birth to her
grave.” If those pushing, struggling
women who are so anxious to get into a
social circle a little above them; or those
who are so fearfully tenacious of their
position that they think it beneath them to
be civil to’inferiors, would but take this
truth to their hearts—that it is not the
position that makes the woman but the
woman who graces and honors it, what a
revolution in thought and there fore in
society, would result!

___...——

Useful Recipes.

 

SCALLOPED Formosa—Pare the potatoes
and slice very thin. In a dish of the required
size, put a little butter in the bottom, then a-
layer of sliced potatoes and a layer of pepper,
salt and butter, and so on until finished, the
last layer being pepper, salt and butter. Fill
up the dish with sweet milk, put in the even
and bake three-quarters of an hour. A very
nice dish for the supper table.

 

Rarsm spurns—Two eggs, one cupful of
sugar, half a cupful of butter, one cupful of
chopped raisins, half a cupful of sour milk,
one teaspoonful of soda dissolved in the milk;
spice to taste; sufiicient flour stirred in to
make the mixture very stiff. Roll out quite
thin, out strips about two inches wide and
four long and roll around the fingers as if
curling hair. Fry in lard till of a delicate
brown. Sprinkle With granulated sugar.

 

Bnornnn Comma—Freshen sonar-e pieces
of salt codfish in cold water over night. In
the morning boil on a wire broiler exactly as
it it were beefsteak. When~done butter it

 

 

theta. food forthetablethey are not

 

 

ting, through which air might pass, but by

and serve on a hot dish.